Hello everyone! I know it's been a long time. I was supposed to post a few weeks ago after my holidays but I had some big medical issue and was unable to write or even think about it. I'm really sorry. I will try to do my best to post the next one sooner. I said try because I'm still under a lot of pain so it's not really easy...But I will try my best! Also I hope you will like this chapter! Like always don't forget to tell me what you think of it! I love feedback.

Thanks to my beta penandpaper83. I don't know what I will do without her.

Chapter 14

"You know you'll have to talk eventually…" Donna said as Rose was still staring at the wall. She had not moved for almost one hour, worrying Donna to no end.

Donna had tried to be understanding and let her have space, but now the silence was starting to be really concerning. To her, Rose looked just like the Doctor when he was in one of his very dark moods. Which was not something to take lightly. The last time she made that mistake, she almost lost her best friend before she had time to know him. And she would not repeat that mistake again. Even if she had to open old wound again, it was for a friend's sake.

"I understand what you're feeling right now, Rose. When my dad had his heart attack...The agonizingly slow wait for news... It was the worst, and I honestly thought I would go crazy," she swallowed hard at the memories. "You can't do anything run everything through your head over and over again." For a moment she was back in that little privacy room. "What you could have done to prevent it. Saying to yourself 'what if' over and over again until you drive yourself mad." She felt her voice crack on the last word. Memories of her mother wailing into her aunt's arms as the Doctor informed them that they could not do anything more. The scent of sickness all around her, and then the sudden numbness when she realized that she would never see her dad again.

As she was trying not to lose herself to that day again, she saw that Rose had finally moved, looking at her with such sad ancient eyes she felt the weight of old tear in her soul. "I thought I would go crazy not knowing. And I probably would had if not for my grandad." She smiled weakly to Rose, who was still looking at her in silence. Showing her support by just being there. "I'm sure you would love him, he's such a silly old man." She chuckled, more at the memory of Wilf than anything else. "If not for him, I don't know where I would be. Or my mom."

Rose finally stood and sat beside Donna, making sure that she was listening. "I lost my dad, but your son is still alive. And knowing the Doctor, he will do everything he could to keep it stay that way. Yes, you did something not really pretty, and your anger was pretty terrifying." Rose looked away in guilt at Donna's words, but Donna was having none of that. "But we all did some things back there that we're not proud of. But that's life." Rose started to open her mouth to respond, but before she could say something, approaching footsteps behind them made her suddenly turn around and jump to her feet making Donna turn around at Rose's actions.

"Well?" Rose asked anxiously over Donna's shoulder, making the redhead realize that Martha had entered without her noticing it.

Martha gave them an exhausted smile. "He is going to live," she promised with a rejoiceful voice. "The Doctor is still with him, but I wanted to tell you the good news." She just had time to finish her sentence before being brutally hugged by a sniffling Rose.

"I knew that man would do something good!" Said proudly Donna, visibly so happy for her friend.

"Oh Donna, the Doctor asked me to have you go back to the TARDIS! He needs you for something," Martha said over Rose's shoulder, who was still hugging her very tightly. She saw Donna hesitate, looking at Rose with indecision. "Don't worry, I'll take care of her," she mouthed, making Donna relax and smile. She nodded one last time, and with a pat on Rose's shoulder, she left for the Tardis. Leaving her two friends alone.

After a few seconds, Rose disentangled herself from Martha with an embarrassed shrug. "Sorry...I was a little emotional."

Martha shrugged as well. "Don't worry, I totally understand. I can imagine it was stressful for you." She smiled reassuringly. "But the Doctor told Tony that he was going to be completely okay in a couple of days. He is going to be groggy for a couple of hours, and his shoulder will be a little tender. But there's going to be no after effects."

Rose eyes widened, her whole body going rigid, ready to bolt towards the TARDIS. "Tony is awake?" But before she had time to move away, Martha was grabbing her, urging her to not run away.

"No wait, I need to talk to you!" Martha saw the look of uncertainty in Rose's eyes, making Martha realize that Rose was not her friend at the moment but Tony's mom. "I swear Tony is doing good, but the Doctor still needs a few minutes to finish with him. Just stay with me a little, and then I swear I'm going to take you to the TARDIS, and let you see your son."

Rose relaxed, but still looked at Martha with a touch of skepticism, not really sure on what she wanted to talk about so desperately. She really hoped that Martha would not ask questions about what happened earlier, because she was not really sure she wanted to talk about it. Especially not if she would be talking to the Doctor later about the very same thing. "Okay… What about?"

Martha sat on one of the broken low walls, patting the spot next to her in invitation. After a few seconds of hesitation, Rose finally joined her. "I know it seems a little weird for you, but I know what will happen if I don't do anything." She sighed as Rose looked at her curiously at that comment. "If I don't say anything then nothing will change, and when this is all over you'll go back to UNIT as some mysterious soldier going all around the world. I'm going to be the doctor who dreamed of stars and the Doctor… Well the Doctor…" She looked pensively at the ceiling where a few traces of glowing energy were still visible. "He'll continue on living, bickering with Donna and showing the universe to Tony. Life will go on. Maybe one day you two will cross paths again. Who knows? Especially with Tony on team TARDIS? But one thing is certain..."

"What?" Rose asked, although she was sure she knew the response already.

Martha looked at her with so much sadness, Rose had to look away. "You'll both end up so miserable, but so stubbornly sure each is doing the right thing that it's going to drive you away from each other again and again until only memories are left. And I can't do that to you, and even less to the Doctor, not after what I had to see him go through," Martha finished with a determined voice.

Rose looked at Martha with curiosity. "What do you mean?"

"I travelled with him for almost two years, three if you count the year that never was. The first thing he talked about when I first crossed the door of the TARDIS was you. I didn't even knew if that ship had room but I already knew your name. And then he showed me the wonders of the universe. But you were still there somewhere, always in the front of his mind. I would ask him something and he would talk about you. Travelling with him was like travelling with a ghost, I was hardly second best for him. Because you were everywhere with us, it was like I was transparent for him. You know how hard it is to see so much wonder, and realize that he would trade everything in an heartbeat to be there with someone else?" She rubbed her eyes tiredly. "Even when he forgot who he was all he could think was you."

"I'm sorry," Rose answered softly. She didn't know what to say honestly. "I didn't go by choice you know."

Martha gave a small humorless chuckle. "I know, don't worry. Even the Master knew. But my point is: you can't just leave like that. Not if it means seeing him slip back into his way, it was too heartbreaking to see. I don't ask you to stay with him. Just that you talk to him. Please, Rose."

"Do you know how long I was in that other universe? How long I was separated from the Doctor?" Rose challenged as her voice cracking a little under the emotions.

Martha started to think about it, realizing her question was more loaded than she anticipated. "You told us before that you came back a little earlier than expected, but you don't look that old. I had you at 28 years old. So six, maybe seven years?" She wasn't really sure about Rose's response, not that she really knew Rose that well. Only what what she saw during the year that never was, and what the Doctor decided to tell her.

Rose laughed, but more at the situation than the guess that Martha just gave. "43 years. Give or take a few months, I'm not certain at this point."

Saying that Martha was shocked was an understatement. The Doctor always told her that Rose was human! He even told it to Jack! How could she had been separated that long without aging even by a little? "How?" Was all she could ask.

Rose shrugged, looking around with a false look of relaxation, like she didn't have a care in the world. "Bad Wolf." She said simply.

"Bad Wolf?" Martha asked with a confused expression, "as in the wolf from the Red riding hood story?"

"When I was Nineteen…" Rose continued as if Martha wasn't speaking. "I did something very dangerous to save the Doctor. I pried opened the heart of the TARDIS." She ignored Martha's gasp of surprise. "And it did something to me… I didn't realize at first, but then after a few years I stopped aging. That's why I can't stay with the Doctor. He is going to blame himself, and I can't let him do that."

"So, you're going to leave him without any explanation, and let him think it's because he failed you completely? How is that better in any sort of way?" Martha asked with a frown and judgemental glare. God how those two people were able to even be in the same vicinity, and somehow manage to communicate without any misunderstanding was a goddamn miracle. "Please just talk to him. I'm not asking you to move back into the TARDIS, but at least explain your point of view."

Rose stood quickly, making Martha jump under the surprise. "I can't tell him what has become of me! I can't!" She started to move around, her stress visible in every step and turn. "This is absolutely not something he can know. And I have my mission and…!" She started hyperventilating, her control going out again. As she felt her head going light, she was suddenly engulfed in a hug and steered against the wall, where she could crumble without hurting herself. After a few minutes, she realized that Martha was talking to her in a low voice, helping her going back into herself without hurting herself or those around her.

"Don't worry, we are not going to tell the Doctor. You are just going to let him talk, and then explain your point of view, and then you are going to see. Nobody is going to force you do anything I promise," she said in a calming voice, not letting her go from the hug. When she realized that Rose was not shaking anymore, she started to release her little by little. "Better?" she asked in a kind voice.

Rose disengaged herself, embarrassed by her outburst of emotions. She looked up at her new friend with a nervous look, realizing that she had probably shown more emotions and instability in the last 24h than in the last ten years. She really hoped that the new companions didn't view her as some sort of broken and hysterical girl unworthy of the Doctor. "I'm usually more balanced. I swear," she promised in a vain tentative of humor.

Martha shrugged. "You forgot that this is not the first time that I've met you. I've been with you during the year that never was, I had time to know you without any interference from the Doctor." She smiled. "Well kinda. You just went an hard time, and with what you lived it's not hard to understand why. I mean everybody would be a little unstable in your situation. You suddenly met the Doctor after more than forty years, and that's still hard to wrap my head around that… I mean I have so many questions. When did you realize you were suddenly not aging? And how were you not able to return to where you were from?"

Rose grabbed Martha, who just kept rambling question after question. "Martha, I'm sorry to tell you this but I don't think it's the time to discuss all that. I want to see Tony and you are right. I have to talk to the Doctor. We can't end things badly. Not again."

"Yes, you're right. Come, I'm going to guide you to the TARDIS, they moved it when the terraforming was working it's magic." With a nod of her head, she began to lead the way. They started to walk in silence for a minute before Martha said, "I'm sorry for earlier, you know. It's just I heard so much about you and finally having you in front of me, I had so many questions."

"I'm normal you know," Rose protested, but after a few seconds of silence, she realized what she just had said. "Well mostly. But it's been years since I did something really out of the ordinary. I'm trying my best to stay out of trouble. Even with UNIT it's sometimes hard. Especially when you know what will happen and you cannot do anything to change the outcome."

"But earlier I saw you." Martha stopped for a second, making Rose falter in her own movement. "Your eyes, they were gold." As they continued walking, she realized that her friend was blushing hard.

"I'm really sorry…" Rose said in a little voice, averting her eyes. "It hasn't happened in such a long time, it took me by surprise. I'm much better at keeping it at bay, but too much in too little time and it had to break free. I'm just happy that I didn't kill anyone."

"It's something that happens regularly?" Martha asked in an horrified voice. Not for Rose but about what she went through. "Can we do something to help?"

"Only a handful of time but now I know how to control it." Rose shrugged. "Most of the time. And we cannot do anything, it's just a side effect of Bad Wolf. Well, right now I only have a suspicion at this point."

"And I suppose you don't want to talk to the Doctor about it?"

"No, never." Rose felt that agitation begin to creep up again. "You have to swear you'll never said a word about this to the Doctor. It's only going to worry him, and then he will try to stop it! And that can't happen!"

Martha looked puzzled, especially about the worry in Rose eyes. "You don't want it to be gone? I imagine that you can control it, but that would not be better to not have it at all?"

"I'm here for a reason. I tried to explain it to the Doctor earlier, but it's a little too complicated to tell in just a few sentences. But to be brief, something is destroying the multiverse and it will start from this one. The only thing I know is it's going to be there soon. I don't know how soon, but I'll say in a few months at most and I'm not going to let Bad Wolf go when I'll need it the most." She shrugged. "For you it's only the visible monster who tried to kill a man in cold blood, but for me it's the constant companion who's been in my life for decades. It's not always easy but I'm not going to separate her from me. It would be like cutting out a part of myself. Just like if I told you to make your hand disappear. It's the same feeling for me."

Martha pondered on what Rose told her and realized that she was far from understanding that woman and what kind of implication she could have on the Doctor life. She had wanted more than anything to reunite those two, probably as much as Donna, but maybe she flung herself in something way too big for her for once. Even too big for the Doctor. But she had to do right for her friend, because she could not bear see him that broken again. "I'm sorry, I didn't understood like that but you're right. It's clearly a situation I don't know well so you need to do whatever you think is right." She breathed in, braving herself, knowing it will probably the last time she could tell something to Rose before life will interfere again and she really needed to make her point of view clear.

As the TARDIS came into view, Martha stopped Rose one last time before letting her go to her son. "Listen, like I said it's your life. You do whatever you want. But as a friend of the Doctor I really need to tell you this. For him it's only been a few years. Nothing compares to you, I know." She placed herself in front of Rose, completely blocking her view and keeping her in place, trying to showing how serious she was. "When you were left behind in that other universe, you were not alone. Your family was with you, helping you mend your broken heart. You had your whole world to fall back on, to make you hope and heal. The Doctor had nothing except a box and two broken hearts. Everything on this planet and even other was only a reminder of you. All he could see when he was looking at me was you. What you could have been, what you could have said. You were the ghost in the machine and I was the painful reminder that you were never going back." She had a sad smile. "And like I said, even when he could not remember his own name, you were only what he could think about. That's how deep he felt. You had forty three years to make peace with what happened. Him? Only maybe four. And one was spent with a sociopath who loved torturing him with memory of you. So please, go see him. But please, remember that when you had a whole system to fell back on, he only had himself." And with a last smile and a quick hug, she was heading confidently towards the shed she saw the Hath trying to put together, happy to have said what she wanted to say. Maybe if she was lucky she would find Donna and tell her everything. She needed to tell the redhead about what happened. Because if even the discussion between the Doctor and Rose went south, she would need reinforcement.

Rose was frozen in place, still processing Martha's little speech. She was ready to cry, her heart breaking under the pain that the Doctor had gone through. Martha had been right. When she lost the Doctor, she had lost part of her soul but she had her mom, dad and even Mickey to help her get back up. But the Doctor had nothing. Gallifrey was no more for a long time now, the family he found in Jackie and herself were suddenly gone like smoke. Only the TARDIS had remained. She had asked him on that beach what would happen for him, but she had hoped that after some time he would find someone else and heal. However, she didn't realize that travelling with someone new would only be a reminder of everything he had lost. She felt a sudden urge to hug him hard and walked with determination towards the TARDIS. After crossing the threshold, she paused on the grating, hearing the gentle hum all around as she was welcomed by the most beautiful sign of the universe. Her son alive and smiling, like he wasn't near death just three hours prior. He was looking with awe at the Doctor, who was so enthralled in the lecture he was giving that he didn't realize that anyone had entered the TARDIS. After a few seconds she cleared her throat making both men jump in the air and turn around at the same time.

"Having fun I see?" she said with a tinkle in her eyes, her happiness shooting from every part of her body.

"Rose!" exclaimed the Doctor, as Tony tried to get up before flopping down again with a grunt, making her suddenly worried that Martha had not told the whole truth as to not trouble her.

Temporarily ignoring the Doctor, she moved forward until she was face to face with her son. As he looked at her innocently, she hesitantly touched his head with affection, not wanting to hurt him more than he already was, making him visibly relax with contentement. As she stroked him fondly, she looked at him from head to toe, trying to find any sign that he was not as well as Martha told her. She noted the arm bandaged, the sling supporting his shoulder and the Doctor hovering not far from him, only keeping quiet out of respect for her. But as she started to show signs of anxiety, she looked directly to the Doctor, who looked at her confidently and happily, making her realize that Tony was probably only suffering the aftereffect of a life saving operation and no real ill effect. Rationally, she knew that since he was awake and moving was a very good sign but she could not help but be a little anxious. She smiled nervously at the Doctor and diverted her eyes back to her son.

"Are you okay?" she questioned him, wanting to hear his voice above else.

"Just tired and rather uncomfortable. My shoulder is still bothering me, but the Doctor told me it's going to be the case for a few days. But I'm just happy to be alive," Tony answered with a smile, his eyes not totally focused, showing he was still feeling residual effect from his time in the infirmary.

Rose brought back a sob, not wanting to concern him with her emotions and smiled brightly. "I'm so happy to hear that. You are going to be back on your feet in no time, you'll see.' She looked at the Doctor, thanking him with a look and a smile before looking back to Tony. "The Doctor and Martha took good care of you."

"Well it helps when you have someone as strong and stubborn as him," the Doctor said with a touch of humor trying to make everyone smile. "I used an Argolexian technology to repair your shoulder and regenerate your arm rapidly. It's going to be a little painful for a week or two, but after that you will have full use of it again." He scanned Tony with the sonic screwdriver, mostly to show Rose that very fact. "Your vitals show that you came through the operation much more easily than normal." He looked at Rose with another fond smile, making her blush under the intensity. "Like mother, like son."

Before she could respond, they heard the door of the TARDIS fly open and Donna rushed through. "Hey, spaceman!" She smiled to Tony. "Glad to see you on your feet. Don't scare us like that again, or help me god I'll smack you so hard, your descendents will feel it."

Tony paled while gulping with wide eyes. "I'll be good."

Donna nodded with severity and turned back to the Doctor. Rose had to turn around to not let Donna see the smirk that was threatening to evolve into a full laugh. She definitely liked her, and was very glad that the Doctor found her, even if she frightened her son half to death.

"Cline and the Hath want to know if they could see Tony," continued Donna, oblivious of the smile on Doctor and Rose face. "They heard that he was alive and on his feet again, and they want to see him." She rolled her eyes. "Apparently, they want him to help create a peace treaty. I personally think it can wait a few days while he rests, but they were insistent. And Martha wanted me to ask, so here I am."

"Let me guess," said the Doctor with laughter in his voice. "She sent you because she was worried you'll start intimidating everyone if she left you alone with them."

Donna smirked. "Yes. Because for me that boy needs rest. Not to play referee to a band of idiots."

"Hey!" Tony protested from the captain's chair. "They are my people, and I want to help!"

Rose looked at him worried. "You just came back from surgery, you need time to get back on your feet. Rest and we will see tomorrow if you feel well enough to move around."

"I feel just fine, Mum!" He turned to the Doctor, who was obviously not trying to get in the middle of his companions and their maternal instinct. "Right, Doctor?"

As the Doctor felt the piercing gaze of his two friends, he shuffled around nervously and scratched his neck absently "If he promises to not overdo himself, I don't see why he couldn't go see what they want" He felt Rose's murderous glare on him making add swiftly, "But with moderation! Just a quick discussion and then back to bed!"

Tony pumped the air. "Yes!" He smiled at Rose. "So I can go?"

Rose sighed, sometimes she wanted to kill the Doctor. "Okay, but you stay with Donna and only for half an hour. Just to see what they want exactly and then back to the TARDIS. You need rest." She crossed her arms, showing him that she was dead serious. Even if a snickering Donna in the background was lessening her effect a little.

Tony nodded eagerly and stood cautiously, noting Rose's concern. She crossed the gaze of Donna, who smiled at her reassuringly. Promising without words that she would take care of him just like she would have done herself. As Tony was escorted by the Doctor, who was babbling excitedly at him. And with the look on Tony face, he was probably producing some last minute advice and recommendation to help him on the mediation between the two colonies.

And with a last wave from Tony and a last knowing look from Donna, they were gone. Rose realized she was now alone with the Doctor and as he walked back to the console and smiled at her with nervousness, she decided that it was now or never.

She took a deep breath and met his gaze with determination. Now or never she said again to herself, you owe him that. "Doctor, I think it's time we talk."